1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a process and apparatus for maintaining the appearance of a hurdle or barrier structure, and more particularly to a removable cover for various parts, especially rails, of equestrian jumps.
2. Description of the Prior Art
For competitive, commercial and aesthetic reasons, producers of horse shows and managers of equestrian facilities that use jumps go to great lengths to keep the jumps freshly painted, often with contrasting colors, and neat in appearance. Jumps commonly used include posts and rails forming imitation fences, plus imitation gates and walls. For safety, the jumps are usually constructed to collapse when struck by a horse.
Jumps quickly become dirty in dusty or muddy riding rings from contact with horses, dirt or mud kicked up by the horses, and especially from being knocked to the ground. Also, the appearance of portable jumps deteriorates from handling as they are loaded into and unloaded from trucks and dropped or placed on truck beds or the ground. Washing a jump is of limited utility since washing does not replace missing or faded paint and after repeated soiling fails to restore a jump to pristine condition. Moreover, washing is time and labor intensive, inconvenient and costly.
In practice, the wear, tear and general abuse to which jumps are subjected requires that they be repainted frequently in order to maintain their appearance, even though, as compared to washing, painting a horse jump is even more time and labor intensive, inconvenient and costly.
Jumps are often made of wood but can also be made of plastic and some other lightweight materials. While plastic may provide a more durable finished appearance than wood and may not require repainting, plastic jumps deteriorate in appearance because of fading, scuffing and soiling, and in time, despite careful washing, become unsightly and unusable in major competition.
It has been proposed to protect various wooden structures with a plastic or rubber sheath. Examples of patents relating to such proposals are a U.S. Pat. No. 4,516,756 to Beatty and a British patent No. 977,383 to Trobridge. The Beatty patent discloses a hollow plastic sheath molded with a desired pigment and placed over an element of a picket fence to avoid the need for repainting. The Trobridge patent discloses a protective and resilient rubber sheath formed with cavities and encasing a jumping rail to avoid injuries occasioned by a splintered rail. However, the sheaths disclosed in the Beatty and Trobridge patents share the disadvantages that they are relatively heavy, expensive and inconvenient to use, that their appearance is degraded when they become soiled, and that they are not conveniently removable and cleanable. Other patents of interest are a U.S. patent to Fett No. 2,119,808, which discloses an automatic hurdle of the type used for athletic purposes (track and field), and a U.S. patent to Naka No. 4,220,316, which discloses a top rail for use with a staircase. The top rail is formed of a rigid synthetic resin such as polyvinyl chloride, polycarbonate, acrylate resin, and melamine.
The current state of the art provides no solution to the problems outlined above and in particular no economical way of maintaining equestrian jumps in pristine condition.